While advertising has not yet reached the standing of an exact science, it is now at the point at which research, particularly copy research, is generally accepted. This has come about because copy research produces verifiable knowledge of audience behavior satisfying two basic advertising needs: guidance for creative people and objective evidence for advertisers of proven results for the money they have spent (1963, Puris.p329). The following is the arrangement of the commonly accepted steps in achieving advertising effect and relating research activity. First, the ad or commercial must appear where consumers see or hear it. Secondly, they must notice it. Thirdly, they must become aware of the company, or product or both. Fourthly, they must learn something from it or react to it. Fifthly, their attitude toward the company or product must change - favorably. Last, they must want to see, try or buy the product.

According to Purvis (1963), research on the first step is commonly known as media research, as distinguished from copy research, which began with Gallup. Yet, the collective wisdom of the advertising Research Foundations, calling for measures of media effectiveness in terms of advertising output rather than exposure input, would seem to presage the end of this artificial distinction (p.329). It is can be said that copy research advertising such began with Gallup. Gallup's doctoral thesis, "An objective method for determining the reader interest in newspapers" in psychology was based on a survey of the editorial and ad content of the Des Moines Register & Tribune.

Gallup reasoned that the best test of reader interest is what he looks at, reads and absorbs. By interviewing a cross-section of the readers and going through copy of the paper page by page with each person interviewed, an accurate measure could be taken by a trained group of interviewers. Thus, a percentage of the readers who saw and read these items and ads in a particular issue could be tallied. Gallup set up the first full-fledged ad agency copy research department at Young & Rubicam, by invitation of Raymond Rubicam. Based on the Gallup procedure, Percival White, then president of the Market Research Corp. of America, began a syndicated service.

Gallup (1947) has measured public opinion by examining the respondent on his knowledge of the subject before asking his opinion. Five steps are followed. "Filter" questions are used first to determine the extent of the respondent's knowledge. Next there is an open-ended question, just to get the respondent to talk freely about the subject. Third, the respondent is asked specific "yes-or-no" questions which require him to vote one way or the other's step four asks him to explain his reasons, and step five asks him how strongly he feels on the subject. Inquiry about the use of the filibuster is followed by a general question as to what the respondent thinks should be done about it (Lucas, 1950).

Gallup (1940) pointed out that the major sources of error in field surveys are: bias in the interview, sampling bias, and lack of sufficient size of sample. Interview and sampling biases have remained largely insignificant due to their minimal influences on the final outcome. The diary method of audience research has been used increasingly in connection with radio listening, and more recently with the viewing of television. The Gallup diary form and equipment were designed to encourage the keeping of accurate records. A chain is attached to the switch, which turns the radio on and off. The other end of this chain is attached to an attractive pencil, which fits into a convenient holder next to the recording form. The set includes a synchronized electric clock, intended to be attractive to the user and to provide a convenient time guide for accuracy in the diary (Lucas, 1950).

Many of the users of readership surveys have become proficient in forecasting the approximate scores on advertisements not yet measured. In fact, some attempts have been made to reduce this process to a formula. Gallup (1947) attempted to develop a systematic procedure based upon a field operation. This method is used to forecast the readership of individual advertisements, but the plan is such that a variety of copy approaches can be tried out simultaneously. In so far as the method is valid, it combines many of the field tests applied in advance of circulation. The readership forecasting procedure is built around a "dummy" magazine, which is distributed to a sample of families. The magazine, called impact is made up in typical format, including editorial matter and advertisements. A considerable economy is affected by combining. The number of editions to be run off at one time depends upon the number of variations of the same advertisement to be tried out (Lucas, 1950).

Throughout his career, George Gallup, the "father" of modern polling, crusaded tirelessly to establish polling's scientific and cultural legitimacy. In public speeches, several books, and more than a hundred articles in journals and popular magazines, Gallup mythologized polling's history of "progress," deflected doubts about the polls' accuracy and technical procedures with the rhetoric of scientific mystification, and celebrated the collective wisdom of "the people." Gallup's "rhetoric of scientific democracy" sustained polling's cultural legitimacy; however, it also diverted attention from its most perplexing sources of error and stifled debate over its deleterious effect on the democratic process <20>.

Throughout his life, Gallup preached about polling with "evangelical devotion." In public speeches, a fewl books, and over a hundred articles in trade publications, academic journals, and popular magazines, Gallup served as polling's unofficial historian as he mythologized the critical incidents in polling's story of "progress." In addition, he campaigned whole heartly to establish polling's claim to science by statistically documenting its record of accuracy and developing lay explanations of its technical procedures. Gallup died in 1984, but his American Institute for Public Opinion Research remains an industry leader. Today, the Gallup Poll is syndicated to hundreds of newspapers and conducts "exclusive" polls for CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, and other news media (p, 161).

Throughout the world today the theory of democratic government is being challenged. The challenge to democratic principles raises two basic questions. The first is whether democracy is the best kind of government. There is abundant evidence that the overwhelming majority of Americans believe it to be the most effective. The traditions of personal liberty, free speech, free assembly, and public debate, are so firmly rooted in this nation that the idea of rule by dictatorship is wholly repulsive to American instincts. The second basic question is how democracy can be made more efficient. A government must be alert, adapt itself to changing conditions, and always seek to improve and refine its techniques. <11> The mechanism for discovering what kind of goverment would be best is heavily based on the public opinion of the the American people.

The effort to discover public opinion has been largely responsible for the introduction of a new instrument for determining public opinion- the cross-section, or sampling survey. By means of nation-wide studies taken at frequent intervals, research workers today are attempting to measure and give voice to the sentiments of the people as a whole on vital issues. The sampling referendum is simply a procedure for sounding the opinions of a relatively small number of persons, selected in such manner as to reflect, with a high degree of accuracy, the views of the entire voting population. In effect, such surveys should canvas the opinions of a miniature electorate. Gallup also stressed that cross-section surveys do not place their chief reliance upon numbers. The technique is based on the idea that a few thousand accurately selected voters will faithfully reflect the views of an electorate of millions of voters. The key to success in this work is the cross section- the proper selection of voters included in the sample <11>.

Whether opinion surveys will prove to be a useful contribution to democracy depends largely on their reliability in measuring popular opinion. During the last few years, the sampling procedure to measure public opinion has been subjected to many tests. In general, these tests indicate that present techniques can attain a high degree of accuracy and it seems reasonable to assume that, with the development of this infant science, the accuracy of its measurements will be constantly improved. Currently, the most practical way to measure the accuracy of the sampling referendum is to compare the forecast of an election with the election results <11>.

During the past few years, an idea has been developing in the field of journalism that has caught the imagination of those who study social and governmental processes. It is the idea that public opinion, the opinion of the masses, can be ascertained at any time on a wide variety of social and political issues by means of the sampling referendum<10>.

Gallup (1938) generalized that public opinion is a societal force that spells power. What people think puts the government in and out of office, starts and stops wars, sets the tone of fashion and morality, makes and breaks heroes<10>. Gallup has developed the polling research techique to capture this influential public opinion.